be registered and should carry a proper notation on it to indicate that it has been copyrighted and when.

Section 35, pages 10 to 29, tends to restore to an author or owner or originator of the copyright the rights that he has forfeited by failure to comply with the present law. That undoubtedly would result in considerable litigation over a matter that possibly is now considered in the public domain or has been used, and by referring to the last three lines of this section on page 30 you will note that the framers even deem that it might not be a valid section and make provision for the protection of the rest of the act in case it should be held invalid. In line 22, page 30, it provides that in case of registration a person desiring protection must file all of the instruments under which he claims the ownership of the copyright. In the case of a periodical this might involve several hundred items, and it would be impossible almost to comply in that way with that. We appreciate that there should be some kind of regulation to cover that feature, because we believe in full registration, but the way it is worded here it seems to point to some difficulties, and we will have our lawyers prepare a provision to cover the section in the particulars we desire.

Now, I want again to reiterate the statement I made at the start, that the periodical publishers have no objections to the authors, composers, and artists having all their rights properly protected, but we do feel that in the lining up of those protections and the restrictions that due consideration must be given to the interests of people that must use their copyrightable material, and we feel in the case of the periodical publications that has not been done in this proposed bill.

Mr. BLOOM. Will you try, Mr. Lucas, to enlighten the committee as to why the daily newspapers are not represented or why they are not in any wise alarmed over the objections you make? The same thing would apply to the daily newspapers, would it not?

Mr. LUCAS. To a certain extent. Mr. Hanson was here the first days of the hearings on this bill and intended to file some objections. I do not know to what extent he went.

Mr. BLOOM. He did not make the objections you made.

Mr. LUCAS. He did not make any objections. He was here but did not make a statement.

Mr. BLOOM. Then why should they not be alarmed?

Mr. LUCAS. I would say it is the same situation with them as existed with us when you considered the Perkins bill before. It has not been analyzed by the people who know.

Mr. BLOOM. They have just as much at stake as you.

Mr. LUCAS. I realize that, and I tell you our people did not analyze this until we had a copyright committee point out where we would be affected. That is the reason now we have so many different angles from different publishers, because it affects them in different

ways.

There is one other kind of publication that I want to refer to now. You had a man here the other day who was the editor of Living Age. He has a peculiar situation in that all the material used by him in his publication-editorial material-is copied from either speeches or editorial matter written in foreign countries on important foreign

subjects. That publication undoubtedly serves an important place with the American people. This man pointed out that it would be absolutely impossible for him to delay its publication until he secured permission from the owner or writer of the original article if we were members of the International Copyright Union. We have a somewhat similar publication in the case of the Literary Digest in the United States. There is a weekly publication that attempts, by reproduction of editorial comment, to acquaint the people of this country generally with the ideas of our newspaper writers on current subjects to-day.

Mr. BLOOM. Do you represent the Literary Digest?

Mr. LUCAS. They are members of our association.

Mr. BLOOM. Will you submit for the committee the different amendments that you would like to have made to this proposed bill? Mr. LUCAS. Yes, sir; I will be glad to submit amendments as far as that can be done. But still we have some main objections that go right to the heart of the bill itself. I question how it can be amended; that is, if the bill must serve the purpose it is intended to--get into the International Copyright Union.

Mr. BLOOM. Mr. Chairman, if there are no objections, your amendment would be to strike out the entire section, whatever it may be.

Mr. LUCAS. Very well. If you want this in specific form, in that way, we can have the amendment prepared, but I thought the committee would prefer to have the details of the publication business presented to you, and how it is different from the book-publishing business and how these provisions adversely affect them.

There is one other general statement I want to make. This bill, as provided in section 1, will give automatic protection of copyright to everything that is written. That means that matter that has value will be protected-the rights will be protected-and matter that has no value will be protected. With the extension of that protection to matter that has no commercial value at all, that will legalize blackmail, if it is used, and many of our publications, especially as I have referred to here, the Literary Digest, might be subject to suits or injunctions or proceedings because of that feature.

Mr. MCLEOD. How do you fix that-that it would legalize blackmail?

Mr. LUCAS. Because it gives protection to something that has no value; something that has always been used generally throughout the country. It has been copied and used in editorial comments. You are putting protection around that matter that prohibits its use when it was not intended to prohibit its use; that is, it prohibits its use you can use it, but in doing it you are subject to infringe

ment.

Mr. MCLEOD. Necessarily?

Mr. LUCAS. If the party that wrote it claims he has the right and wants to sue you; yes.

Mr. GOODWIN. Suppose a man delivers a speech and says he has copyrighted it, but a newspaper man in the audience copies it and puts it in a newspaper-is that an infringement?

Mr. LUCAS. If the speaker had reduced that speech to writing. under section 1 of this act, I would say he had copyright protection,

and if the newspaper reproduced it he could be sued by that man, if he wanted to. However, the man might want it reproduced.

Mr. MCLEOD. That is his right, is it not?

Mr. LUCAS. That is the point. You are protecting things that should be protected. I agree with you there. Anything that has value should be protected, but in doing that you protect things that have no value.

Mr. MCLEOD. What is an example of that?

Mr. LUCAS. Take paragraphs written in newspapers.
Mr. MCLEOD. That are not copyrighted?

Mr. LUCAS. To-day they are not copyrighted, because the writer of them does not consider them of sufficient value to go through the formality of registration. That raises the question that has been explained to us partially by the Authors' League. The question of fair use there have been suits brought under the present law in regard to the use of quoted matter of that kind and the courts have allowed a certain discretion of fair use. We suggested that the authors in preparing this bill, put a provision in there allowing fair use of such publications as is done with newspapers and the Literary Digest.

Mr. MCLEOD. Has there been damages allowed along that line? Mr. Lucas. Well, the courts have allowed fair use. The authors in this bill are trying to get into words of law the protection they want. In the Canadian law there is a specification for fair use. Mr. BLOOM. How do they define in the law "fair use?"

Mr. WEIL. They do not define it.

Mr. BLOOM. Then, how are we going to write it in?

Mr. MCLEOD. You admit there is no abuse of that now?

Mr. LUCAS. The Canadian law provides, under section 16-

Provided, That the following act shall not constitute an infringement of a copyright,

and subdivision 1 of that says that any fair dealing with any work for the purpose of private study, research, criticism, review, or newspaper summary-to my mind I see no reason why we can not have the same privilege written into the act.

Mr. BLOOM. They are going far afield there, I think.

Mr. MCLEOD. You say there has been no damage demonstrated in the past?

Mr. LUCAS. There has been some damage, but in most cases the courts have decided that there has been no damage where there has been a small use.

Mr. MCLEOD. Has there been any big use where there was damage sustained by the person innocently using a quotation?

Mr. LUCAS. No; but you have a law providing in this bill that there shall be a penalty for it, and the question in my mind is why, and that brings me back to the original suggestion I made that copyrighted matter should be registered and only copyrighted matter will be registered that the owner thinks worthy of being registered. Then you will not have matter copyrighted that is not of value. Mr. BLOOM. You are against the automatic copyright?

Mr. LUCAS. Absolutely. All of this, gentlemen, leads up to one general conclusion, which, to my mind, is that in the framing of a bill that is so wide in its scope as this copyright bill, you can not

have general provisions that are unreasonable to specific copyrightable items, such as small items in periodicals, and that in preparing your bill the utmost care must be used to see that all of those interests are protected.

I do not want to add too much, but there is just one concluding sentence that I would like to read into the record that was sent me by one of the publishers. It is a general conclusion that, I think, is worthy of consideration:

Copyright legislation must take into account the interplay of three sets of persons and be so conceived as to safeguard the rights and equities of all three. First, the creators of copyrightable matter of whatever nature.

Second, the disseminators of such copyrightable work, whether they be printers, publishers, dramatic producers, singers, speakers, or radio broadcasters.

Third, the general public which has long believed it to be a good public policy to encourage the creation of art, literature, the drama, and allied activities by granting, for limited terms, monopolistic rights to original creators of those various fields. Careful study of H. R. 10434 does not lead the investigator to the conclusion that the respective rights and equities of these three classes of persons affected were given full and equal consideration in the framing of this bill. This measure is frankly drawn so to favor the first of these three classes as almost to ignore the rights of the second and third. There is no apparent effort manifested to strike a fair balance between these three sets of interests.

The language of certain sections of this bill is such that the analyst is forced to the conclusion that the framers of the measure were so exclusively bent upon protecting the granted rights of authors, composers, and dramatists that they had only the smallest concern for any interests that might come into conflict with these rights. Careful study of those sections, which describe the various forms of legal redress upon copyright owners who believe their works have been infringed, reflects a recklessness and an obliviousness to practical consequences that are almost incredible to the student with sufficient imagination to perceive the lengths to which application of these clauses would go and the hardships they would work.

Persons who have practical knowledge of the commercial publication of any authorities subject to copyright can scarcely avoid the conclusion that in some respects this partisan championship of the authors and composers has been so overdone that it would bring embarrassments almost as great as the benefits it seeks to confer. The fact any copyrightable work automatically becomes copyrighted by reduction to writing, words, musical notations, drawings, designs, or photographic negatives, immediately presents untold opportunities for disputes, controversy, blackmail, and litigation conceived in bad faith. Equally pernicious and confusing are the provisions exempting copyright proprietors from the duty of printing copyright notices and from complying with the simple and inexpensive formalities which are so well worth observing if copyright matter is worth copyrighting at all.

General copyright legislation is, from its very nature and from the mass of technicalities which surround it, extremely difficult to frame in wisdom, equity, and reasonable expectancy of beneficent application. It should, as has been said, take due account of the equities due to the three classes of persons involved, but it should be attempted only with the cooperation of many persons of long experience in the varied fields in which the copyright operates. This bill does not appear to have been drawn under such conditions as must be present if sound beneficial legislation is to result.

Mr. MCLEOD. You have used the word "blackmail" several times, and I wonder if it is not used in an improper fashion. Blackmail is an illegal threat. If this was enacted into law, this would be legal. Mr. LUCAS. You do not get the idea of how that would be used. Mr. MCLEOD. Blackmail is just one word.

Mr. LUCAS. That is true, but I think it is proper the way I have used it. Blackmail would result from the threatened suit in connec

tion with items where there might be some questionable dispute as to ownership and where a publisher would rather pay the amount than be bothered or have the publication held up or interfered with by the provisions of the law.

Mr. MCLEOD. Then it would not be blackmail, would it?

Mr. LUCAS. It would be blackmail if the men did not have a right to it.

Mr. MCLEOD. But he did have a right to it.

Mr. LUCAS. I say it would be some one who had no right to bring the claim.

Mr. MCLEOD. He would have to have a legal status to make a claim.

Mr. LUCAS. You would have to establish that legal right, but it is a question whether the publisher would want to go through the courts with it.

Mr. BLOOM. What will the lawyers do then? Would you have any objection to giving the name of the party who wrote that letter?

Mr. LUCAS. I would rather not. It was not given to me for that purpose.

Mr. BLOOM. That letter is rather a strong letter, and if that gentleman wants to come before this committee and make any objection in those words, I would like to have him here. I would like to ask him several questions.

Mr. LUCAS. I have made almost the same objections.

Mr. BLOOM. But here is a man making some very damaging statements, especially to the framers of this bill, people who are trying to give everyone right and justice. In this letter he claims we are favoring a certain class of people. I do not know of any people this committee is favoring. We are sitting here day after day trying to get the facts.

Mr. LUCAS. You misunderstand the facts.

Mr. BLOOM. I did not misunderstand the letter, though.

Mr. LUCAS. This bill was drafted by the authors, composers, and

Mr. BLOOM. I know, but everyone was given an opportunity to come in and sit there day after day and try to iron out their differences. There is no name behind this letter that is written into the record, and the writer of that letter has made certain statements that I would like to ask some questions about. Who are the people this committee is trying to favor? I do not know who they are.

Mr. LUCAS. This letter does not say that the committee is trying to favor anyone.

Mr. BLOOM. He said this legislation is for the benefit of certain

Mr. LUCAS. Proposed by a certain interest. I have explained that we have no animosity toward the authors, as such, but they have prepared a bill that is designed for their interests. We are here to state what our objections are, and I think I have presented all of the objections I have that are included in that letter."

Mr. BLOOM. Mr. Chairman, I make a motion that the letter be excluded from the record unless we know who wrote it. I do not think there is any foundation for it.

Mr. MCLEOD. I do not see any reason for the letter going into, the record, as the gentleman has made his statement including those objections.